Guard the Viewpoint by Viola Worthen Gustin

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · Sep 14, 1916

Guard the Viewpoint

By Viola Worthen Gustin

VIOLA WORTHEN GUSTIN

THREE-YEAR-OLD Brother was sitting one day in his beloved high chair, when some one said, “Soon Baby Sister will be big enough to need a high chair. Then she will have yours; and what will you think of that?”

The little face clouded. Was his high chair to be taken away from him, and given to some one else? But mother spoke: “Will you not be glad when Baby Sister is big enough to sit in your high chair?” she asked.

Immediately the cloudy face brightened, and many times since then he has come to mother with a beaming smile to tell her how glad he will be when Baby Sister is big enough to sit in his high chair.

As in this case, does not the attitude of the children toward the newcomers in the family usually depend very largely on the grown-ups?

One day this same mother heard a friend say to her two little girls, who had been looking lovingly and longingly at a sweet baby, and thinking of the time when they would have a baby in their own home, “If we have a baby like that, you will not have much time to play; you will have to take care of it.” Instead of thus teaching her children to look upon the baby as a burden and a trouble, could not this mother as easily have taught them to look forward to its care as a great privilege?

Lynden, Wash.